Rewintering

Just as we settle in with the idea that winter came to a premature and unceremonious conclusion this year, the snow's back on the peaks and the weather is turned cold again. Snow and mud commingle and shorts and sunblock are re-relegated to backseat status. Out again with the thick socks and winter coats and skis and gloves.

Re-opening and re-snowpacking of the local hills has people in a tizzy about last chances resurrected, and the effect on the brain of seesawing between two distinct seasons, the transition between which is normally heralded and affective enough, has brought downright confusion to my own brain and body, if not to the population at large.

The normal turning of thoughts in the spring is still happening, it's just that we get to experience it during winter conditions. And, I suspect, it will make the true arrival of spring something much more likely to be celebrated. The doom and gloom is on pause--no more incessant talk about what a rough summer it'll be and how we're doomed for months of fire and drought. Now, we hope. A good boating season. Good crops. Snow that sticks to the high country until at least early in the summer.

We pay close attention to these things, especially those of us who have abandoned the trend toward insulation from our world. We don't dash from AC home to AC car to AC work and back in reverse during the summer, and we relish the finer points of seasonal change. It marks the march of life. It divides our lives and memories into understandable and bookmarkable segments. It connects us to the world and to each other.

So, winter is back, though how briefly we don't know, and we love it.